Arizona Colleges Remove DEI Statements from Job Applications
Publicly funded universities in Arizona will no longer have mandatory Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) pledges for job applications, according to an announcement by the Arizona Board of Regents.
A report by the Goldwater Institute earlier this year detailed the increasingly common practice of colleges across the country requiring faculty job applicants to provide mandatory “diversity statements.” The report found that up to 80% of faculty positions at Arizona public universities required a DEI pledge.
“College administrators across the country are increasingly requiring ideologically charged ‘diversity statements’ from faculty applicants as a way to suppress the hiring of politically independent or conservative candidates,”
The Goldwater Institute
Now, the Arizona Board of Regents (ABOR) has announced that Arizona publicly funded universities will be waiving this requirement. Sarah Harper, vice president of communications for ABOR, said in a statement that DEI statements were never officially required by ABOR, but in the past some departments at Arizona universities “may have included a request for a DEI statement in a job application.” She went on to state that, “the universities have discontinued any requests for such statements in job applications.”
“This is a huge victory for academic freedom and the First Amendment,” said Goldwater Institute President and CEO Victor Riches. “The Goldwater Institute is continuing to show the nation how to defeat the destructive ideologies that are crippling colleges and universities.”
The Goldwater Institute has noted in its findings how DEI statements have been used to eliminate undesired applicants. At the University of California, diversity statements have eliminated over 75% of job applicants.
“DEI programs and ‘statements’ do not produce free expression nor more diversity of thought, equal opportunities, and a culture that includes everyone in school activities because DEI’s guiding principles are rooted in the racially discriminatory worldview known as critical race theory.”
Jonathan Butcher, senior fellow at the Goldwater Institute
